Focusing for the Oral Presentation

Gilberto Berríos

Departamento de Idiomas

Universidad Simón Bolívar

April 27, 2004

Many Questions to Answer

Purposes

To introduce focusing as the first step of the oral presentation process

To show how answering certain questions will help you to achieve focus

Agenda

What is focus?

How is focus achieved?

Humans are bad estimators

Procrastination

People

Preparation time

Topic difficulty

Our personal abilities

Presentation time

We tend to misjudge

Procrastinating

Procrastinating = putting off preparation for unjustified reasons

Procrastinating underpreparedness

more anxious delivery more fear of questions

Stop Procrastinating

One solution to procrastination is to start preparing as soon as possible.

The first thing to do is to give the presentation some focus.

What is focus?

“A point to which something converges or from which something diverges”

“A point in an optical system to which rays converge or from which they appear to diverge”

What is focus?

Convergence:

a center of interest

Focusing: Minor Questions

When—Day and time How Long—Presentation plus Q&A Where—Venue and type of room What equipment—And access to it

Don’t worry!

Focusing: Minor Questions

Answers to minor questions can be found relatively easily

Get straightforward answers from: – your boss– event organizers– administrators– colleagues

Focusing: Major Questions

What

Why

Who

How

Whatfor

Focusing: Major Questions

Topic

Motivation

Audience

Strategy

Purpose

Focusing: What

The Topic

—What you will talk about Familiar to you

– If not, do some research and study Partly unfamiliar to your audience

– So they will be neither bored nor lost Relevant to both

Focusing: Who

The Audience

—Who you will talk to Who are they? What do they do? How many are coming? What is their motivation? How familiar is the topic to them? …

Focusing: Why

The Motivation

—What moves you to talk Motive(s) for giving the presentation Must be clear to you May be same as purpose, but not

necessarily

Focusing: What for

The Purpose

—What you plan to achieve Expresses your goal Announces goal with a verb: “I’m here

today to…” Must be clear to you Can be explicit or implicit, depending on

strategy

Focusing: HowThe Strategy

—How you will get organized Strategy = Structure Structure = Outline

XxxxxxxXxxxxx

Xxxx xxxx Xxxxx

Xxx xxx Xxxxx

XxxxxXxxxx

STAMP: Major questions

Topic Audience Motivation Purpose Strategy

Strategy TopicAudienceMotivation Purpose

Remember

First, get straightforward answers to minor focus questions

Then, use the acronym STAMP to gradually answer the major focus questions

Thank you